February 22, 2014 7:24 AM

Question of the day: WTF is wrong with Arizona??

The Arizona Legislature has passed a controversial religion bill that is again thrusting Arizona into the national spotlight in a debate over discrimination. House Bill 2153/Senate Bill 1062, written by the conservative advocacy group Center for Arizona Policy and the Christian legal organization Alliance Defending Freedom, would allow individuals to use religious beliefs as a defense against a lawsuit. The bill, which was introduced last month and has been described by opponents as discriminatory against gays and lesbians, has drawn national media coverage.

The Far Right never wavers in their efforts to divide America into “us” and “them.” In that spirit the Arizona Legislature has stepped up and passed a bill that would allow Arizonans to discriminate against member of the LGBT community on the basis of “religious belief.” Governor Jan Brewer has five days from yesterday to sign or veto the bill. While no one seems to know what she’ll do with the bill, it’s astonishing that an American state is a signature away from making overt discrimination against a minority class legal.

A reasonable person might have suspected Arizona’s leaders learned a lesson from the SB1070 fiasco. The resulting boycotts that cost Arizona millions in lost convention and tourism business made it clear that Americans won’t stand for state-sponsored racism. The Grand Canyon State may find out that Americans won’t countenance state-sanctioned homophobia, either.

Bills of this sort are infecting legislatures all over the country. It seems that a lot of good, God-fearing Christians can’t stand the idea that they have to tolerate gays and lesbians in their midst. They see nothing wrong with treating the LGBT community as second-class, as “less than.” They’re organized and mean-spirited enough to attempt to codify that hatred and discrimination in legislation. That this sort of state-sanctioned repression and discrimination probably won’t pass constitutional muster appears not to matter. The theory seems to be that if enough of this sort of legislation is thrown against the wall, some of it’s bound to stick.

What’s next? Pink triangles?

Here’s a radical idea: If your “religious faith” allows you to discriminate against gays and lesbians, your faith sucks…because it has nothing to do with the teachings of Jesus Christ. I don’t even believe in God, but I know that much about Christianity, which seems to be more than the Radical Religious Right understands.

How about a little peace, love, and understanding? Or does your flavor of Jesus give you license to discriminate and repress what you hate and fear?

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on February 22, 2014 7:24 AM.

This is what Greg Abbott has hitched his wagon to was the previous entry in this blog.

Funny how just being decent seems radical these days, eh? is the next entry in this blog.

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